


Let's Go Steal a Family

by magnetgirl



Category: Leverage
Genre: F/M, Families of Choice, Kid Fic, Leverage Thing-a-Thon, M/M, Multi, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-02
Updated: 2015-08-02
Packaged: 2018-04-12 14:37:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 2,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4483109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magnetgirl/pseuds/magnetgirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Leverage team decide they don't need to settle down in order to start a family.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Charlotte Ford

Charlotte was first.

Well, no, Olivia was first, but that’s another story and she doesn’t appear in this one until much later.

Charlotte was born almost a year into Nate’s retirement. That’s what he called it. Sophie called it his Act 3.

Charlotte was very nearly born on stage because her mother refused to stop working. The company was on a roll, she explained, forward momentum was fleeting, and pregnancy was no reason to slow down. Joan Bennet was pregnant when she played Amy March on film and it’s considered one of her best roles. Pregnancy helps an actress be really in touch with both her body and her emotions. Pregnancy was the best thing to ever happen to Sophie Deveraux’s career as an actress, director, and producer.

It was the worst thing to happen to Nate’s retirement. With nothing to do but worry about Sophie, and she who would be Charlotte, but never Sam, he started to spiral. He tried to hide the terror but Sophie knew better, as she always did. She understood why he was suddenly short with everyone, suddenly drinking too much again, suddenly wouldn’t answer Eliot’s calls or Hardison’s emails. He didn’t want to answer Parker’s questions about a baby. He didn’t want to talk about it at all. Not even to Sophie. Especially not to Maggie. But Maggie was who Sophie called because Sophie understood even better than Nate did.

“When I close my eyes… I see her in a hospital bed. Dying.”

“Sophie?”

“No. Yes. In a way. A tiny Sophie. Our daughter. My daughter.” His speech was quiet, broken, but also deliberate, tight. There was a storm of emotion behind the words. Maggie understood, too.

She didn’t say it wouldn’t happen again. How could they know? How could she argue it? She wouldn’t hurt him that way.

She didn’t tell him it would be different this time. The treatment existed and nothing would stop them getting it. He knew that. The guilt was still there. He couldn’t hurt her that way.

“She must be so beautiful,” she said, with honesty, and regret, but no sorrow. Not for new life. Nate frowned. Maggie touched the crease between his eyes and he began to cry.

“She is,” he whispered.

“She will be,” Maggie corrected.

Six months later Charlotte Margaret Ford was born.


	2. Layla Spencer

Layla was next.

It was a job, like any other, or so they thought. A corrupt pharmaceutical company, peddling phony cures and untested drugs. But those were only the surface lies — the ones that hid the deeper crimes. Human trafficking, experiments on the homeless, children born to be lab rats.

Layla was tiny, blond, pale, and the first time Eliot saw her she kicked him in the shin, pulled his hair, and tumbled away into a laundry chute. He shook his head, not entirely sure it happened.

The second time Eliot saw Layla, she was creeping under a table, hoping to snatch a meal. Their eyes met and she turned to run, but he knocked a basket of rolls and fruit her way. Her eyes narrowed, but she took it with her when she scampered away. Eliot couldn’t shake the feeling he knew her.

The third time Eliot saw Layla he was looking for her. The job was done, the criminals brought down, the kids rescued. All but the tiny, blond, pale shin-kicker. Hardison’s instruments showed no sign of a little girl, no sign of anyone. Eliot refused to leave without her, sat down in the now empty building and waited.

“What do you want?” She appeared out of nowhere.

“There you are.”

“Here I am.” She crossed her arms. “What do you want?”

“My friends and I — we arranged a, uh, a place for you to stay.” He smiled, she scowled. “I want to bring you.”

“I got a place to stay.”

“You shouldn’t be alone.”

She shrugged. “I like it.”

He leaned back, arms crossed, unwittingly reflecting her posture. “Really?”

She opened her mouth to say yes, of course, now go away. But she didn’t. “Can I go with you?”

Eliot’s mouth dropped open. Hardison was babbling in his ear. Tell her about the school, the other kids, the cafeteria, the computers. Sell her on the plan, don’t give her false hopes. Whatever you do don’t say —

“Okay,” said Eliot.

“Okay,” said Layla.


	3. Dylan Hardison

Layla had been with them for five months when Hardison met Dylan. He was undercover as an IT specialist rewiring the 20th district of Chicago PD, working to get his hands on evidence of political corruption. Dylan was brought in by a novice, he’d been found on the steps of the church. They’d closed their orphanage two years before.

“He won’t talk.”

Hardison glanced over, met the boy’s eyes, brightly intelligent under his long black bangs.The cop told the nun to leave him and started to call Children and Family Services but his partner returned to call him into an interrogation.

“You. Bug guy.”

Hardison frowned. “Me?”

“Yeah, you’re tech right? But a cop.”

Hardison nodded. “Yes, sir.”

“Good. Watch this kid.”

“Uh…”

The cop stood and started to walk off. “I’ll call DCFS, just watch him for an hour, whatever, okay?”

“Uh…”

The cop was gone. The kid watched Alec with solemn eyes.

“Hi.”

No response.

“I’m…”Hardison didn’t know what name to use. “What’s your name?”

The boy continued to watch silently.

“Okay, well. I’ve got work to do.” He pointed to the computer. “Work. Okay?”

The boy nodded. Hardison turned back to his computer…and so did the child. He looked intently between the screen and the man.

“Oh, so, you wanna help?”

The boy nodded again.

“Aight. Here’s what we’re doing.” Hardison talked through every step of his hack, assuming the mute toddler wouldn’t give them away. The kid listened as intently as he watched. The cops were gone far longer than an hour, but neither Hardison nor his shadow noticed or cared.

“Kid still here? Though someone’d call a van for him.”

“Van?” Hardison asked. “I thought you were calling DCF.”

“Yeah..." The cop waved his hand. Whatever. "Can you do it?”

“Uh…” The boy slipped his hand into Hardison’s.

“Thanks.”

Alec had a higher regard for the foster system than Parker did, but Layla had opened up new avenues for their family. “Hi, I’m calling from the 20. Got a kid here, abandoned. No ID, doesn’t talk. Look, what’s the process if his mom can’t be found?” They went over waiting periods, exhaustive searches for blood relatives, paperwork, legal proceedings. All the red tape that Hardison hated, that had led to his hacking in the first place. Frustrated he set up a pick up for the boy.

“I’ma check on you, ‘kay?”

The boy nodded. Hardison drew him into a hug, neither wanted to let go.

Five weeks later Dylan’s mother was found dead. Drug overdose. The clock started on a search for his father. Hardison convinced his partners to do their own search and they turned up four possibilities, tested their blood -- Parker's grift skills had really improved over the years -- but none matched. They could wait the allotted time and try to adopt him legally, but their normal aliases wouldn’t be good enough. It was easier to use the boy’s resemblance to Eliot. Easier to create the persona of a drifter who’d recently found a good Southern girl to settle down with, a man eager to redeem himself in the eyes of the son he didn’t know he’d had, and in the memory of the young woman he’d failed. The office was overburdened and Hardison made sure Dylan’s case was transferred to the officer most likely to swallow their story.

Hardison stayed out of sight until Eliot, Parker, Layla, and Dylan were far from the eyes of the Chicago social workers. When he finally reveled himself Dylan ran straight into his arms.


	4. Peter Parker

Parker found Peter in the parking lot of a grocery store.

“You what?”

“I couldn’t leave him there. Something bad would have happened.” Parker felt this should be obvious.

Eliot opened and closed his mouth a few or twenty times trying to figure how to explain the fifty other more appropriate actions she might have taken before picking up the infant seat and bringing the baby home.

“So, you kidnapped him,” Hardison extrapolated.

Parker shook her head. “He didn’t belong to anybody.”

“How do you—“ Eliot started, and stopped, and counted to twenty once, twice, and then twice again. Parker played Itsy-Bitsy-Spider with the baby. Hardison started searching the web for Amber Alerts. 

"I want to call him 'Peter'."

"Parker, you can't just pick up a baby and decide he's yours."

"Why not?" Eliot started counting again. Parker bit her lip. "You have a kid." Hardison looked up from his search. Parker met his eyes. "You have a kid. Nate and Sophie have a kid. How come I don't get one?"

Eliot sighed. "Parker, that's not--"

"I'm not good enough?"

A kind of silence fell. Parker stared defiantly at her boys. 

"Babe, you're the best of us," said Alec, because he believed it. 

"You're good enough," said Eliot, because it was the truth. 

Hardison's computer pinged. He glanced over. "There's no one looking for a baby taken from the Foster Street Mariano's lot," he reported. "So far."

Eliot sighed again. "Keep the alerts active for a while." Hardison nodded. He knew. 

Parker picked the baby up out of the seat and moved his arm to wave at the boys. "Say hello to your daddys." The baby obligingly cooed. Parker grinned as widely as if she'd held half a million dollars in her arms. "Now we're a real family," she announced. "Layla Spencer, Dylan Hardison and Peter Parker."

Eliot spit out his soda in a sputter but Hardison's grin was as wide as Parker's. It was the perfect name for a future wall-crawling do-gooder thief. 


	5. Olivia Sterling

Olivia was twenty-eight when she got the call. She was both too young and too old for the job. 

"We have a hitter," Nate explained. 

Layla was almost seventeen, older than Charlotte who'd been five when Eliot took her in at seven. Part of her didn't think they needed Olivia. But she'd become a team-player, however reluctantly, and was willing to listen. Just so long as this adult outsider listened to her and her brothers. And her cousin, she guesses. Charlotte and Layla don't see eye to eye all the time. 

"And a hacker."

Dylan was no longer mute, but still a young man of few words. Aged fourteen and already the second best hacker Nate knew. He could get into any college with a free ride, Nate was certain, but he was happy assisting his dad and creating video games on the side. 

"A grifter."

Here, Nate spoke with unconcealed pride. Charlotte was fifteen, beautiful, clever, gifted, talented, the best person he'd ever met and she was his daughter. His and Sophie's and the perfect mix of both. He'd feared every year of her life but she'd turned out stronger and better than he could ever imagine. She could have been Mastermind if she'd wanted, but she had all her mother's flair for the dramatic, and that only made him prouder. 

"And a thief."

At nine Peter was the youngest of the four by almost five years. But his mother had turned him into a thief worthy of the nickname Spider-Man. There was nowhere, nowhere!, the two of them couldn't get in. 

"We need you to be the brains."

Olivia was an adult and she'd been groomed to work for Interpol. She'd dreamed of following in her father's footsteps, not her wayward uncle's. But she had a rebellious streak and as straight-laced as Jim Sterling is, or at least pretends to be, Olivia wanted to do more, to be more. She wanted, not so secretly, to be the kind of superhero Nate Ford represented. Somebody who worked where the law gave up. That's not bad, right?

"Who would I answer to?"

Nate considered. "Parker and I would advise you as much as you want, and we'll interfere if you or any of the others get in over your heads. But you'd only answer to your clients, and your cause."

Oliva set her jaw. "I'm in."


End file.
